Ayar, Z. & Yangın-Ekşi, Y. (2019). Continuing professional development options of foreign language school directors International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET), 6(3). 707-721. http://iojet.org/index.php/IOJET/article/view/644 Received: 15.04.2019 Received in revised form: 30.05.2019 Accepted: 30.06.2019 CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT OPTIONS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE SCHOOL DIRECTORS1 Research Article Zülal Ayar Ankara University ayarz@ankara.edu.tr Gonca Yangın Ekşi Gazi University goncayangin@gmail.com Zülal Ayar is a Ph.D. candidate in English Language Teaching at Gazi University, and a full- time instructor at Ankara University, Turkey. She held her master’s degree at Ondokuz Mayıs University, Samsun, Turkey. Her field of study is language teacher education. Gonca Yangın Ekşi is an Associate Professor Doctor in English Language Teaching at Gazi University, Turkey. She received her master’s and Ph.D. degrees in English Language Teaching. Her field of study is using technology in language teaching, young learners, teacher education. Copyright by Informascope. Material published and so copyrighted may not be published elsewhere without the written permission of IOJET. http://iojet.org/index.php/IOJET/article/view/644 mailto:goncayangin@gmail.com https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9029-7164 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3555-7258 Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 707 CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT OPTIONS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE SCHOOL DIRECTORS Zülal Ayar ayarz@ankara.edu.tr Gonca Yangın-Ekşi goncayangin@gmail.com Abstract The professional development activities designed solely by respecting the instructors and the trainers are mostly presented to fail to reflect the operations at schools of foreign languages. Hence, continuing professional development programs need to include the directors of the schools, and their preferences about the practices. To this end, the current study is of significance in terms of highlighting the opinions of the directors about CPD process in Turkey. The study was conducted at two state and two foundation universities through questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Purposive sampling method was utilized while determining the participants of this research. Having filled in the questionnaires which include some statements about their educational background, personal preferences of CPD, and the operationalization of professional development process, four directors gave answers to some of these questions in an interview to explain critical points thoroughly. According to interpretations of the data gathered from the directors, it was concluded that the directors at state universities could not have equal chance to adopt and serve opportunities for the instructors compared with the foundation universities. Nevertheless, the directors whose educational background has been grounded to ELT were noted to be more successful in implementation of CPD events. Keywords: CPD, School of Foreign Languages, Directors 1. Introduction As an essential part of teacher education, schools are expected to regard Continuing Professional Development (CPD) as the prerequisite of self-improvement process among teachers. In that respect the needs, opinions, beliefs and expectations of teachers cannot be ignored. On the contrary, they must overlap with the preferences of teacher trainers and directors about the program. Thus, CPD comprises quite a few elements so as to make teachers successful on the way to maintain their professionalism, and it is worth handling this term individually to examine whether its potential has been fully exploited. CPD is an umbrella term which covers any kind of academic attempts of teachers in order to achieve self-actualization, lifelong learning via critical thinking, language awareness, and reflectivity. CPD is often confused with other terminologies, such as professionalization, professionalism, teacher training, teacher development and professional development. To start with professionalization (Leung, 2013), it stands for a step on which teachers need to discover their immediate needs and inadequacy in teaching performance to arrive at mailto:ayarz@ankara.edu.tr mailto:goncayangin@gmail.com International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 708 professionalism. As for professionalism, it means that teachers have recognized the importance of ‘self-actualization’ in their career, and they are closer to achieve CPD practices in line with their goals. In reference to teacher training, it can be accepted as a sub-set of teacher development. Head and Taylor (1997) emphasize the distinction that teacher training is obligatory, limited, and implemented by supervisors. On the other hand, teacher development directs teachers to be life-long learners, and motivates them to feel pleasure of giving lectures. Finally, as reported by Mann (2005), professional development and CPD can be differentiated by illustrating CPD as the route to arrive at autonomy in teaching, whereas professional development can solely be compulsory, career focused, and quite constrained. In short, it is probable to summarize that all those terms have paved the way to identify CPD literally in teacher education. CPD can also be introduced as the backbone of education system. Nevertheless, Çelik, Çepni and İlyas (2013) remarked that though instructors have the awareness of professional improvement, and appreciate the value of CPD in their academic lives, they could not internalize these events. Thus, apart from teacher trainers’, and the instructors’, the opinions of the directors should also be respected as one of the stakeholders to increase the functionality of CPD in schools. 2. Literature Review Similar to teachers at primary, secondary or high school, the instructors at schools of foreign languages are also in need of CPD so that they could determine their needs, plan their self-learning process, trainings and development. Nonetheless, as detailed by some other scholars (Ar, 1998; Aydın et al., 2017; Çelik et al., 2013; Ekşi and Aydın, 2013; Özcan, 2011; Şentuna, 2002), the studies administered at these schools in Turkey to unearth the contentment of the instructors and the efficiency of these programs have displayed some failures and inoperative points in CPD practices. Even though these results often reveal the opinions of instructors, directors are also a serious factor in CPD process. Hence, their academic background and roles in decision-taking process about CPD would matter in the efficiency of programs on instructors (Alan, 2003; Coşkuner, 2001; Gültekin, 2007; Şahin, 2006; Türkay, 2000; Yurtsever, 2013). In spite of the fact that being director requires multi-layered authority like managing the school, developing organization, leading staff to life-long learning, enabling the best teaching and learning atmosphere to teachers, and strengthening collegiality, all these responsibilities meet at a common point which is providing continuous professional learning and development in schools (Schleicher, 2012). Rather than basing operationalization of CPD on trial and error technique in order to accomplish it thoroughly in educational settings, directors should show regard to expanding knowledge among all stakeholders (Mizell, 2010), and they are to believe in change not only about trainings, yet students, teachers, and their expectations. This is because every school and its needs are unique, and adopting one strategy to be followed at each institution would not bring success. Regarding another fundamental point, Pedder, Storey and Opfer (2008) indicated perceptions of directors about CPD. Accordingly, directors have placed considerable emphasis on the programs which basically address learning process, immediate needs, developing and working with others as well as in-school trainings than receiving any assistance from guests, external trainers or hosting corporations. This finding accords with the fact that directors need instant, particular and sustainable solutions conforming best to their own schools besides identifying the weight of pedagogical content knowledge in teaching-learning discipline (Aydın et al., 2017; Gültekin, 2007). The prevalent problem among directors as to CPD is the short-term efficiency of these Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 709 programs on teachers and students’ level of progress (Peterson, 2002). Beyers and Mohloana (2015) and Mizell (2010) stated that funding, workload, timing appeared as the most remarkable obstacles before directors. This also reveals the fact that when the quality in trainings could not be maintained well within professional continuum, its consequence will become evident on students themselves. Considering the mentioned missing aspects of CPD programs, this research has been carried out to find the answers to two questions as follows: 1. Do the opinions of state and foundation universities’ directors of foreign language schools differ with regard to CPD practices? 2. What kind of CPD practices can occur at state and foundation universities according to background of the directors? 3. Methodology 3.1. Participants and Setting Two directors at state universities and another two directors at foundation universities volunteered to be participants. Four universities at distinct cities, Ankara and İzmir, were included in the current study. Especially state universities were well-established educational institutions with its reputation of training students in Turkey. According to the directors’ demographic information form, all of the directors were over 40, and they had teaching experience from 11 to 31 years. Two directors held their PhD degrees in English Language Teaching (ELT). One of the directors of the foundation universities completed his bachelor’s degree in English Language and Literature, and master’s degree in ELT. As an American, and the native speaker of the target language, he could continue his academic work in Educational Leadership. Different from the other three, one director’s major is Japanese Language and Literature. 3.2. Instruments A mixed methods research was included to reach both quantitative and qualitative data and triangulate them (Creswell, 2014). A questionnaire and an interview were utilized as data collection tools, respectively. In terms of content validity, a thorough literature review and expert view were implicated in both instruments. After getting basic descriptive results of the participants through the questionnaire, a semi-structured interview was conducted to the same directors in order to gain more detailed knowledge about their opinions of the functioning of CPD at schools (Mertens, 2014; Patton, 2005). Quantitative data was comprised of Likert- scale question types and multiple-choice forms about professional development process, the personal preferences about CPD, and professional development programs. Qualitative data were attained via the interview which elaborate similar questions in the questionnaire. The questionnaire and the interview were in Turkish, the mother tongue of the directors because of the fact that one of them continued his career in Japanese language. 3.3. Data Collection Having applied for the ethical consideration process via the correspondence among the institutions, and obtained ethics committee approval, the researcher launched piloting process at School of Foreign Languages in Samsun (a state university) and Ankara (a foundation university) at the beginning of 2018-2019 academic year in September. Depending on the answers, the questionnaire was revised and some new alternatives were included into the questions so as to create its final version. The data collection process started through the questionnaires. Then, the semi-structured interviews with a similar scope were tape recorded International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 710 and transcribed by keeping the research questions in mind in November and December. These universities were chosen according to purposive sampling procedure in a non-random manner (Flick, 2014). 3.4. Data Analysis The data collected via interviews were analysed depending on grounded theory. This is because it has a methodical code to gather, synthesize, analyse, and conceptualize qualitative data inductively. During data analysis process, upon transcribing the interviews, two coders classified each question according to the answers of instructors, teacher trainers and directors under correlated codes, and thus they began the first coding to examine and measure the data in a well-regulated way. Likewise, by keeping the research questions and the codes in mind, the researcher and the second coder detected themes when the feasible links among them were affirmed. Therefore, the procedure of designing themes was to arrange framework of data analysis systematically. After the analyses of the instrument by the researcher, an expert with PhD in the field once again investigated the interviews, and transcripts to confirm the results, and ensure inter-coder reliability. 4. Findings and Discussion Firstly, the descriptive analyses of the findings were indicated by the tables below. This was to clarify whether directors at state and foundation universities had different practices with regard to reflecting opinions about CPD at schools. Subsequently, the discussion was made, and the results were commented on the basis of the differences in CPD implementations at schools according to background of the directors. 4.1. The Practices of the Directors about CPD at School of Foreign Languages Table 1. CPD Process 1 State University Foundation University Total Part 2 N N N 1. What is the number of English language teachers in your institution? 10 to 50 51 to 100 101 to 150 1 1 2 151 to 200 1 1 2 2. Do you have a professional development unit at school? Yes 2 2 4 No 3. What are the ways of professional development opportunities to your English language teachers at school? academic support through CPD 2 2 4 extra time for CPD 2 2 CPD programs 1 1 2 mentoring 1 1 2 Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 711 other ways of motivation: providing them to present their MA or PhD thesis, implementing a Micro-Credential Badge Program 1 1 2 4. Who are the decision makers of the content of the CPD program? you 1 1 2 teacher trainers 2 2 4 teachers all together 2 2 other (bookshop volunteers) 1 1 5. How do you inquire about English language teachers’ continuing development in academic studies? with the help of teacher trainers 1 2 3 with an evaluation system in your institution 1 2 3 6. How could you be informed about teachers’ needs to sustain their professional development? via needs analysis 2 2 4 teacher trainers’ contact with teachers and their reflections 2 2 4 in meetings 2 1 3 The table introduced that all universities had Professional Development Unit (PDU) and employed a large number of instructors changing from 100 to 200. Similar to Gültekin (2007), the directors were also reported to reflect their full support to the instructors on the way to improve themselves professionally by establishing CPD units at schools, and providing extra time to think about CPD activities. It means that unlike in Alan’s (2003) and Türkay’s (2000) study, they were noted to feel satisfied to offer alternatives to the instructors in self-fulfilment process. Furthermore, they all identified teacher trainers as the decision makers of contents of CPD programs. However, regarding the other frequencies, it can be deduced that they also had an authority to comment their design. In addition, the directors of two foundation universities reported the contributions of all instructors to shape their scope. In other words, similar to Gültekin’s (2007) and Schleicher’s (2012) statements, the directors believed in the coordination among teacher trainers and the instructors to cooperate with each other. Moreover, it appeared that the directors at foundation universities attended decision- making process more than at state universities. Finally, the table demonstrated how careful the directors were to meet the needs of the instructors through needs analysis and meetings. Table 2. CPD Process 2 State University Foundation University Total Part 2 N N N 7. Are your professional development programs voluntary or compulsory for English language teachers to attend? voluntary 1 1 2 International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 712 compulsory 1 1 2 8. How long do the CPD programs last? up to 60 minutes 1 1 up to 90 minutes 1 1 up to 120 minutes 1 1 it varies depending on session 1 1 9. How often could you organize these trainings? once every two or three weeks 1 1 2 once a term 1 1 2 10. How do you obtain academic assistance for your trainers’ professional attainment? sending them other courses 2 1 3 other (providing courses within the institution) 1 1 11. How do you provide opportunities for your trainers’ professional attainment? sending them other courses 2 2 4 if necessary sending to other cities 1 1 2 other (hosted conferences) 1 1 12. Could you fund money for professional development activities at your school? Definitely true 1 1 Mostly true 1 1 Not sure Mostly false 1 1 2 Definitely false 1 1 This quantitative finding was also supported with the interview of the participants. In the forthcoming statement, it was seen that trainings could be run voluntarily or compulsorily depending on some factors like appraisal system, and they took longer at foundation universities. Likewise, Director of State University 1 (DSI) approved that: ‘In regulations or legislations, there is no such a kind of unit to be promoted by the universities or the Council of Higher Education (CoHE). That’s why, as in each state school, it is to be grounded on a volunteer basis.’ The intervals between each session might vary from every three weeks to once a term or every five months. As in Arıkan’s (2002) research, owing to this huge gap among directors to the time period of CPD, it was construed that even at the same context, state or foundation, the number of these events may alter. The directors also expressed the facilities of the school, such as sending academic staff to other courses when they cannot supply a workshop with a similar content, and the speakers at those courses were well-known. The financial support of foundation universities unlike state universities can be noticed herein clearly when the rates of the directors and their comments in the interviews were Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 713 considered. Director of Foundation University (DF1) noted down: ‘We have sent some of our instructors even to foreign countries to receive these trainings and be involved in projects. Moreover, the school has enough budget to invite some trainers to give presentations and CPD events to the academic staff.’ Director of Foundation University 2 (DF2) also mentioned the financial support of the school on the way to prepare a new program to the instructors called ‘credentialing, badging system’: ‘… Regarding specifically professional development, the number one thing that I have done is I broaden what we are calling micro-credential, badging system in here. It is still early stages. We are getting awareness of the program. But once it is upon running, I think it is going to be effective for professional development…’ Table 3. CPD Process and Personal Priority of the Directors State University Foundation University Total Part 2 N N N 13. Could you provide support (extra time) for professional development activities at your school? Definitely true 1 1 2 Mostly true 1 1 Not sure 1 1 Mostly false Definitely false 14. Do you have a specific format or school based system to evaluate teachers’ progress in the light of these courses? Definitely true 1 1 Mostly true 1 1 2 Not sure 1 1 Mostly false Definitely false 15. Do you believe that professional development practices are to be fulfilled according to teachers’ needs? Definitely true 2 2 Mostly true 2 2 Not sure Mostly false Definitely false 16. Do you think that your school represents a warm learning atmosphere for all teachers? Definitely true 2 1 3 International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 714 Mostly true 1 1 Not sure Mostly false Definitely false 17. What do you think about the programs developed and carried out by teacher trainers? you know the procedures of how they design it 2 2 4 you have already attended one of the trainings 1 2 3 they pay attention to teachers’ reflections, and your view 1 2 3 Similar to the third item in the second table, in general the directors also encouraged CPD activities with the provision of extra time to outline and enrich with appropriate techniques. DS2 (Director of State University 2) remarked it: ‘We try to strengthen teacher education by supplying an off-day to the instructors who would like to hold master or doctorate degrees.’ Additionally, Director of State University 1 (DS1) highlighted: ‘Even though CPD cannot function as the way desired in that school, as the principals, we try to do our bits to encourage these studies. To the new or part- time instructors, mentoring and observations are kept by teacher trainers. Furthermore, educational programs are prepared in line with their needs to encourage them to work here ambitiously.’ Upon scrutinizing the following question, which enlightened the directors’ personal preferences about performing CPD, foundation universities evoked a more positive approach to track a specific, unique form of assessment type than state universities. This is because they felt very competent on the running system at school. DF1 proved this notion: ‘The performance appraisal system is managed at school for instructors to choose which workshops they want to attend instead of forcing them to take part in each. They might also give presentations to the colleagues about their academic studies. Accordingly, the number of the events they participated is calculated and their points are identified.’ To clarify the subsequent questions, the needs of the instructors and the rapport among them were noted as important values in CPD issue by the directors. It was disclosed that nearly as much as foundation universities, the directors at state universities were close followers of the progress they made on the instructors via CPD events. Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 715 Table 4. The Preferences of the Directors State University Foundation University Total Part 2 N N N 18. How do you delegate the duties of teachers and teacher trainers according to importance (from 5 to 1)? the experience 8 2 their major 5 6 educational background 6 9 their certificates 5 7 general view towards them at school 3 5 19. What are your suggestions to improve CPD in your institution? providing integration of ideas among colleagues 1 1 2 helping teachers to see the theoretical background of teaching practices 1 1 motivating teachers to seek for their own professional trainings 2 2 4 offering creativity 1 1 2 handling recent issues about language teaching 2 2 creating a learning environment among colleagues 2 2 4 Unlike other questions, the first item in Table 4 requested directors to give an order of importance according to the criteria they applied to assign instructors or teacher trainers in their institutions. Subsequently, foundation universities placed emphasis on ‘educational background’ of their academic staff, whereas ‘experience’ was ranked as the first substantial factor at state universities. Thus, there appears to be a tendency to recruit more experienced instructors at state universities. Finally, the directors presented their advice to upgrade the effectiveness of current CPD programs at schools. To this respect, stimulating instructors to gain autonomy and build collegiality among them were rated the first in increasing the impact of CPD practices. This finding is also in accordance with the indications of Mizell (2010). DF2 and DS2 declared notions and upheld this view once again: ‘…I really appreciate Teacher Development Unit (TDU). They didn’t just say “Okay, we have to do something to improve our writing instruction, let’s have a seminar on Tuesday afternoon. They didn’t do that. What they did was they had two hours-session in orientation week. They had another two hours session in a couple of weeks later. And then, the third one another weeks later. So, all in all about six hours of classroom. You are part of training, and working together on these issues.’ ‘We send them to this kind of seminar, providing financial support to 2-3 people, such as instructors who have a certain consciousness and are International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 716 knowledgeable in the exam unit. What we want later is to share their learning outcomes, they gained there, with their colleagues here.’ Table 5. CPD Programs 1 State University Foundation University Total Part 3 N N N 1. Please choose any one (s) of the following relevant reasons for the programs in your school. Request from the director 1 1 2 Request from instructors 1 1 General academic policy to follow Increasing students’ achievement levels 2 2 4 The number of novice teachers 1 1 The promotion of other teacher training programs, such as INGED, TESOL Forming the culture of the institution according to the learning organization 2 1 3 2. Please tick the ways of your CPD program evaluation feedback below. interviews 1 2 3 questionnaires 2 1 3 feedback from teachers 2 2 4 peer observations 1 1 2 taking part in the lesson with teachers 1 1 the data gathered from the studies 1 1 Part 3 covered CPD programs at school of foreign languages from the point of the directors. Consequently, the directors presented the students’ performance as the pivotal element behind the existence of those programs at school. Moreover, state universities grounded the support of the programs on multiple reasons like their appeals to academic staff, the number of the instructors who were less experienced, and forming a culture special to the organisation. This shows the fact that foundation universities had more evident and certain motives to administer those events, while state universities were not so apparent and coherent in their justification to adopt CPD activities in their institutions. This can also be seen with the explications of two directors, DS1 and DF1 respectively. ‘We can only interfere in the trainings when the needs became too apparent to be concerned.’ ‘The school takes teacher education seriously in that it is reflected to students’ success. PDU meet up, determine the required type of education, and identify the ways of keeping observations among instructors within a specific schedule at the very beginning of the term.’ As an indispensable part of teaching and learning process, these programs were to be evaluated in the end. Nonetheless, the means of assessment might vary according to directors at each school. As is seen in the table, all of the directors treated ‘feedback from teachers’ Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 717 being the most compatible way of learning the appraisement of that system. Yet, the means of tools utilized to be informed about this process outnumbered at foundation universities, which exhibits the higher quantity in that context. Table 6. CPD Programs 2 State University Foundation University Total Part 3 N N N 3. How do you conduct CPD in your school your institution? Your institution 2 2 4 British Council 1 1 English Language Education Association (INGED, IATEFL, TESOL) 1 1 2 International Publishing Houses 1 1 2 4. Please choose any one (s) of the following relevant reasons that teachers might not be willing to take part in CPD courses according to your perception. They feel they are qualified enough not to participate any trainings 1 1 They believe gaining experience in years can make them professional 1 1 They do not want to hear any theoretical information to adopt into their class 1 1 2 They do not gain any benefit for their academic status 1 2 3 They cannot earn extra money when they attend these programs 1 1 They do not want to invest time for these extracurricular activities 1 1 2 They may not relate their needs with the content of the program 1 2 3 They might not find teacher trainers competent enough in their field 1 1 5. Please choose any of the relevant reasons below what professional development could mean for the teachers in your institution. attending seminars on ELT 2 1 3 holding academic degrees 1 1 being knowledgeable about how to use instructional technology 1 1 reading and following ELT resource books 1 1 the exchange of ideas with colleagues 1 1 2 carrying out action research 1 2 3 recording class performance to examine later 1 1 2 International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 718 implementing new teaching methods in class 1 1 2 being able to motivate oneself/gain autonomy 1 1 learning the ways of using technology in class 2 1 3 dealing with students’ needs and being able to redesign the lesson 2 1 3 the competence of evaluating the effectiveness of one’s teaching 1 1 2 It was also exposed that CPD activities were mostly held at universities locally as was put forward by Pedder, Storey, and Opfer (2008), though the help of external organizations, such as British Council or international publishing houses were appealed now and then. The directors expressed potential rationales lying behind the reluctance of the instructors who refused to attend CPD events at school, too. To directors, they would not like to volunteer these trainings due to the lack of any impulsion in the recovery of their academic status. Besides, as was also dealt in previous explanations, their needs may not match with the program prepared by the PDU. In other words, directors observed and detected the fact that the interest of instructors in their academic positions or titles, and any probable mismatch between their needs and the school program can be the driving factor in their disinclination towards CPD. Finally, they interpreted the meaning of CPD from the perspective of the instructors. ‘Attending seminars on ELT’, ‘carrying out action research’, ‘learning the ways of using technology in the class’ and ‘dealing with students’ needs and being able to redesign the lesson’ became prominent as the most rated answers in total. It means that directors attached importance to keep in line with the recent trends in ELT. Thus, they must have paid attention to pedagogic knowledge in teaching English, given priority to hire ELT graduate instructors in their institutions. At least, they heartedly promoted the instructors with other majors like English Language and Literature or Linguistics to get help in methodology and other teaching language matters through seminars. In the same vein, other three most desired features of instructors by the directors met on a common ground ‘the competence of carrying out teaching performance in the light of their educational background’. 4.2. The Connection between Educational Background of the Directors and CPD Activities at Schools Upon investigating the academic bases of the directors, it came into sight that the directors at one of the state and foundation universities were ELT professionals, a lot more experienced, and they had less academic staff in their institutions. In parallel, they considered the leadership of the directors (Peterson, 2002) while giving opportunities to the instructors like providing extra time to hold their academic degrees or be engaged in CPD. Furthermore, similar to Gültekin’s (2007) research, they were personally included into the planning of CPD contents in order to keep interaction among stakeholders. Regarding their suggestions and the route they followed in teacher education, ‘motivation’ was quite an essential term for them as in Aydın et al. (2017). They controlled the duration of the sessions within 60 to 90 minutes, and paid attention to the frequency of these activities which was once every two or three weeks. Similarly, while interpreting the questions in part 3, these two directors mostly touched on the practicality of activities which predicated topics on its theoretical base. This is Ayar & Yangın-Ekşi 719 because they can be activated according to immediate needs or requests of the instructors. Therefore, they presented various choices to instructors in conducting CPD events as well as the school, such as English Language Education Association (INGED), Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). Another critical issue was the criteria during delegating roles and duties to academic staff. At that point, one of the state and foundation universities reflected ‘the major’ as the most prominent item. Then, the other two ranked ‘educational background’. In the third list, ‘certificates’ was top graded, while ‘the general view towards them at school’ could be placed in the last. Nonetheless, ‘experience’ was regarded as the best only by one of the state universities. In brief, the correlation between the educational background of the directors and their priority in role assignment could only be achieved at one state and one foundation universities. The preferences of directors at other two universities could not show consistency as was also inspected in cooperation they offered to the instructors. 5. Conclusions and Implications for Further Research Four directors at schools of foreign languages of different universities in Turkey attended this study. They shared their views about the quality of CPD systems in their organizations, and presented some practical suggestions to improve their quality. Besides the university types, the majors of the directors were investigated in order to reveal their background knowledge and then interpret the functions of CPD at those schools in a better way. To conclude, the directors at foundation universities were reported to have extensive opportunities, such as giving instructors an opportunity to attend external events, subsidizing intuition fees to national and international trainings so that instructors could accomplish autonomy and self-actualization. The directors whose field of specialization was ELT were one step ahead than the others with regard to organize, administer, and assess the instructors’ level of success after CPD activities. By considering the result of that research, it can be suggested that directors should have clear-cut criteria about identifying the decision-makers to develop program’s content. They need to include instructors’ opinions more during this process. Additionally, more ELT graduate instructors should be recruited so as to advance the quality of CPD activities. In order to raise CPD achievement, the directors should also provide extra time, and an office separated only for PDU members to work in. The present study is important in that it brings the opinions and practices of four directors about CPD from two distinct contexts. Shedding light on their perceptions regarding the implementation of CPD programs, developing an understanding toward the attitude of them about CPD process, and revealing both overlapping and missing points from dual perspectives (instructors and directors themselves) will possibly lead to an increase in the prestige of CPD research in language teaching. In regard to the results, a further study can be operated at universities after three to five years in order to record the changes at schools. Besides that, the study can also be beneficial to the schools or universities which are on the way to establish PDU. Notes 1This study is a part of doctoral dissertation called ‘Expectations and Practices for Continuing Professional Development at Turkish State and Foundation Universities: A Suggested Model’. International Online Journal of Education and Teaching (IOJET) 2019, 6(3), 707-721 720 References Alan, B. (2003). 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